The Episcopal
Church, once the proud home of 11 U.S. Presidents, committed spiritual
suicide this week when its bishops and deputies to a General Convention
approved the election of world's first bishop to divorce his wife and enter
an open homosexual relationship with a male partner.

In effect, the church crucified itself on the cross of
a behavior condemned in Scripture two millennia before AIDS appeared to kill
nearly a million homosexual Americans.

The House of Bishops voted 62-43 to approve
bishop-elect of New Hampshire, V. Gene Robinson, a day after the vote was
postponed due to sexual charges filed against him.

Moments after the vote, 19 conservative bishops, slowly
walked to the front of the assembled bishops. "This body has divided itself
for millions of Anglican Christians around the world, brothers and sisters
who have pleaded with us to maintain the church's traditional teaching on
marriage and sexuality," Pittsburgh Bishop Robert Duncan said. "With grief
too deep for words, the bishops who stand before you must reject this
action."

Duncan said that he and his colleagues called upon the
top leaders of the Anglican Communion, the 38 primates of 72 million
Anglicans to intervene in the "pastoral emergency that has overtaken the
church. May God have mercy on this church."

The next day the schism was plainly visible as 47
bishops were absent and entire delegations were gone from the House of
Deputies. Others wore black arm bands or ashes of mourning, such as the
Rev. Kendall Harmon, who read a statement, signed by dozens, saying "This
church will never be the same again." He denounced "overturning the
unambiguous moral teaching" of the universal church, that he said "must be
corrected by the Anglican Communion."

However, most of the Episcopal Church delegates
rejoiced over Robinson's election. "It's a great day for the church," said
the Rev. Sandye Wilson of Minnesota. "This is a church which has finally
understood that men and women created in the vision of God can be the
guardians of the faith - and be gay or lesbian."

Robinson himself, standing with his grown daughter and
partner, Mark Andrew, said, "God is doing a new thing...I am proud to be in
a church which works to be a safe place for all of God's children." He
predicted that when Episcopalians "go to church on Sunday, it is going to
look pretty much like last Sunday."

Not really. Certainly, the numbers will be thinner.
Traditional believers are being driven out of the church. You've seen those
rusting signs, "The Episcopal Church welcomes you."

Since 1965, the
church has lost a third of its members, 1.3 million people including this
writer. Half of the church's 7,360 congregations have less
than 37 souls.

"Conservative Episcopalians are threatening to withhold
millions of dollars in parish donations and form a separate U.S. church,"
reports Julia Duin in "The Washington Times."

The drive for that move comes from the American
Anglican Council, which said the Episcopal Church "shattered the Anglican
family" and "departed from the historic Christian faith." It called for an
October meeting in Texas of conservative Episcopalians with representatives
of the world Anglican Communion.

A day after approving Robinson's election, the House of
Bishops voted by an overwhelming voice vote to allow individual dioceses to
bless same-sex unions. In its only concession to conservatives, the bishops
did not call for creating an official church liturgy.

"They passed a local option, and a local option
translates into anything goes," said Rev. David C. Anderson, president of
the American Anglican Council.

The vote on Robinson was expected Monday, but was
postponed when two charges of sexual impropriety surfaced. One was an email
from a Vermont Episcopalian alleging that Robinson "put his hands on me
inappropriately." An investigation revealed that he was touched only on his
shoulder and back, which seems innocuous.

The other allegation came from David Virtue, whose
website, virtuosityonline.org, cited OUTRIGHT, an Internet site of a group
that Robinson helped create for "young gay, lesbian, bisexual and
questioning people ages 22 and under."

It provided links to Internet sites such as
www.threepillows.com with hard core pornography. Virtue charged, "This is
youth ministry like you have never seen it. Rather than leading young people
to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ, it offers adolescents a
church-affirmed invitation to...perverse sex."

The hard core links, which Robinson said he was unaware
of, were removed within hours. However the site still has perverted
material, such as a posting by OLD GOAT "looking for a young/slim
attractive/ married male on the femm side for casual sex."